America’s Future Depends on Quality Child Care

Quality child care not only fuels our country’s economic engine by helping parents work, but also builds the workforce of the future.

Today, the majority of women with infants (62% of mothers) return to the workforce within the first year after their child’s birth. More than half of children under the age of three (more than 6 million) spend some or all of their day being cared for by someone other than their parents.

Why Child Care Quality Matters

Quality child care feeds a baby’s growing brain, building the foundation for the development and learning necessary for them to thrive as adults.

In the first three years of life, brain connections form at the rate of more than 1 million per second. Positive interactions with nurturing caregivers reinforce these connections, creating a strong foundation.

Quality child care prepares babies for future learning and success. This includes cognitive and communication skills, expanded vocabulary, social and emotional skills, and higher scores on math and language measures over time.

In high-quality environments, children have been shown to have enhanced vocabularies, have more sophisticated attention and memory skills, and get along better with peers.

Quality care is tough to access, especially for those who need it most. Three out of four infants are in low or mediocre quality care settings that can be detrimental to their development.

Low-income children fall behind well before they enter Pre-K. Research shows that at age 2, low-income toddlers are already 6 months behind in their language processing skills.

Access to quality child care can set low-income children on a path to:

Higher reading and math achievement;

Complete elementary and high school on time;

Attend and complete college;

Increased earnings;

Greater employment; and

Better health as adults.

Despite research that shows at-risk children – children from families with few resources and under great stress – benefit most from quality child care, low quality care is often the only care available in low-income communities.

Components of Quality Child Care

A nurturing environment. The quality of child care ultimately boils down to the relationship between the child care provider and the child. To help children make connections that support their development, there should be no more than a 1:4 caregiver to child ratio and no more than eight children per group.

A competent workforce. Caregivers and teachers should have specialized knowledge and skill in early childhood development, with a focus on infant and toddlers.

A compensated workforce. Average child care wages are at the bottom of the occupational ladder at just over $10 an hour, despite extensive research showing that better paid staff are associated with better quality care.

Continuity of care. One primary, but not exclusive, caregiver for at least one year, and optimally until age three, is critical for an infant’s emotional development.

Child Care Cost

In 33 states and Washington, D.C., child care costs more than college tuition at a state university.

Child care assistance for low-income families reaches fewer than one out of every six eligible children and is continuing to decline.

Many low-income families don’t benefit from the current child care tax credit because they have little or no federal income tax liability. Moreover, the maximum tax benefit does not approach the actual cost of infant-toddler care.

The cost of center-based, infant child care remains unaffordable in 49 states and Washington, D.C.– if it can be found at all.

Policy Recommendations

The child care system has been starved for resources. Funding for the Child Care and Development Fund has stagnated over the past decade. As a result, since 2006, the number of children served by the Child Care and Development Block Grant has dropped by more than 373,000.

Quality—the aspect of child care that recognizes its importance in influencing rapid brain development of young children in care—has not been a central emphasis of child care funding over the past few decades.

Congress must come together to make affordable, high-quality child care a reality for working families.